The Expanse

DVD, Enterprise S2 (The Expanse)

I have very mixed feelings seeing this episode again. I haven't seen it since it was first shown in the early 2000s, and I know what happens next, the shape of the series to come. I'm sad that they had to turn their back on the simplicity of a new mission every week, and the possibilities that remaining within the realm of the familiar might have brought. It was shown to us in Season 4, but I wonder what stories involving the Klingons, the Vulcans, the Andorians and perhaps other known races might have been like. Instead they chose to do something drastic and give the series a sense of purpose which had been lacking. This was a bold move in that they were showing how willing they were to try something radical, yet it was also a safe move. They must have planned out how the story would unfold and Season 3 would turn out to be fairly straightforward, as I remember it. The positive side was that they would have licence to create new races and new situations as never before, but what they didn't realise is that they had that avenue open to them in normal space, but they got too bogged down in getting the next story done, keeping to continuity and trying to use characters that had become undeveloped, that the DNA of the series was beginning to unravel, as shown in the ratings.

At the same time as being sad about the change in direction, particularly in the ruthless way Trip and Archer resolve to do whatever it takes (which, ironically was also my favourite scene, the only time there some feeling crept into the story is when the pair drink together at a table, toasting Henry Archer, and the music, for once, reflects the weight of the mission, evoking a legendary quality), I was also glad that new urgency and motivation had been instigated. Too often in Season 2 episodes were little more than filler, with hardly any development of characters, a lack of enjoyable crew interaction and exciting or original stories and situations. The writers needed an injection of danger to play against because space had not truly been proved to be the difficult place it seemed in Season 1.

Taking Season 2 as a whole I've felt that it was the worst season in Trek history, the highest number of flops perhaps, the lowest feeling of tension and wonder for sure. Seeing it again has helped me reevaluate the season, and while I certainly haven't done a 180 on it, it reminded me that among the chaff is also the wheat, those solid, enjoyable episodes that make re-watching a series worthwhile, and even one episode which stood out as being a classic. That was 'Regeneration,' and to that list of my favourites I would add 'Marauders,' 'Canamar,' 'Future Tense,' 'Horizon' and 'The Catwalk.' A few episodes I enjoyed more this time, but still, there were too many that fell at the hurdles of story, concept and involvement. Too many consisted of stuff happening, and to some degree I'd put this episode into that category.

'The Expanse' is a mishmash. You have the Klingons, the Suliban, the mysterious Future Guy, the Xindi probe, Starfleet and some of its ships, and the Vulcans. None of them are part of a coherent plot that satisfyingly unfolds, but most are episodes; a series of happenings. Take the Suliban and their long-awaited return. I loved the race, but Season 2 only featured them in the season-opener and this, the ending. The Temporal Cold War seemed to have been pretty much dropped, where it should have been built upon. The concept was the best to come out of the series and could have provided a fantastic link to the 24th or even 23rd centuries, but it simply wasn't explored. So now that we come to it again it seems shallow and basic. Even the effects of the 'future' room that were so effective in the pilot, come across as flat here. The budget for the pilot notwithstanding, technology had moved on in the two years since then and they should have been able to match the visuals.

Instead we get a brightly lit room with Future Guy standing on his podium. Suliban ships come into play with barely a few seconds notice, and before we know it Archer's been kidnapped, unceremoniously and with ease. He's escorted in, told to go nearer so Future Guy can see him better, and promptly circles the podium so the guy can't see him at all! The effect of FG is weak, and in the harsh light his dark form looks wrong. It doesn't help that we never really know why he wanted Earth to beat the Xindi, although at least he had a plausible reason for waiting to tell humans until after the probe's attack: they wouldn't have believed him otherwise. If you can forgive the weak dramatic tension of the scene it does raise questions as to motive and the whole Cold War plot, but even getting to that point was problematic, and why doesn't FG want the timeline messed with when that's all he's been doing since the series began? The scenes should have been vibrant and energetic, mysterious and compelling, but they're too flat. Think back to 'Shockwave' and the excitement and action of the Suliban boarding, and that's what I wanted to see. It's not like they'd forgotten how to do it, as shown with the recent 'Regeneration.' They needed to top that, but they didn't even try. That sentiment stretched to the Klingons too.

Duras talks about boarding parties, but we never see them. I so wanted Enterprise crew to have to defend their ship internally, phaser battles, hand to hand throughout (think 'The Way of The Warrior'), but the size of the ship and the sets didn't lend themselves to such scenarios, a design flaw for the series, I think. Although they did find room for a briefing room instead of the little situation area at the back of the bridge. Was this an indication that they recognised a cramped ship wasn't such a good idea after all? If seeing Silik for his blink-and-miss-it cameo (and I can't imagine John Fleck was too thrilled to be called back to do such minor work - his lines could have come from anyone, there was no personal connection being developed), is a disappointment, the role the Klingons play is equally so - too fearful to enter the Expanse? These are Klingons! They were trying to make out that it was so bad even the warrior race won't go in, I get that, but it doesn't do much for their space-lane cred! I like that there was an attempt at an ongoing story this season with Archer their target, but Duras was the worst kind of a Klingon fool. He was not a villain in the same league as Archer so it shouldn't be a surprise that he's brushed off like an annoying fly - there's little doubt that he's one character that wouldn't be returning seeing a his ship gets blown up. Not that he was a good villain, but I feel they should have left a bit of uncertainty over his demise even if they never used him again.

I did like the battle at the edge of the Delphic Expanse, it showed how far CGI had come and made up for the lack of momentum in much of the episode, as well as the poor CGI that features in the same episode. The scenes at the end must have had a lot more work and a far more talented artist working on them than the scene on Earth when Reed and Trip survey the damage. I mean, this stuff is terrible - it looks like a very basic computer game, there's so little reality there. I can understand that creating naturalistic environments was harder than space effects, but even so, this looks like an end of season rush job. The way it was filmed wasn't ideal, either, with the actors viewed from below, and so obviously blue screen. What should have spoken of the terrible devastation was taken away by poor effects work. You don't get that when you see the old matte paintings, for example the devastation caused by the Borg in 'The Best of Both Worlds, Part I,' another season ender.

It's not fair to compare this with one of the best Trek episodes ever, but you'd think with technology at the state it was then that things could only have been more impressive in that department. I give credit to them for the actual attack on Earth, but again, there are no people so it's a terribly dispassionate incident, and like Trip it's hard to get past the anger of it to some actual emotion. The trouble with the episode is that it rarely takes the time to feel, preferring to brazen it out like a Vulcan, and unfortunately they seem to be the most emotional beings in the story, T'Pol almost getting upset over her orders to return to Vulcan, and Soval, as usual, free to allow his annoyance to creep into his voice. The scene with the Vulcan doctor was interesting and gave Phlox a chance to 'own' his sickbay, and he was quite well-served, what with that and the scene where he explains his loyalty to the ship for T'Pol's benefit. She really doesn't seem like the aged Vulcan we know her to be, clearly having little or no experience in divided loyalty, she comes across as the age of the actress. This would be fine, but we know she's had a previous career as a Vulcan operative thanks to 'The Seventh,' but how many times does that age wisdom and experience show through?

Mayweather is once again, basically a helm computer, and it struck me why he doesn't get the chance to be more involved in the stories: he doesn't have anyone to talk to, unlike 'TOS' where they had Sulu and Chekov, or 'TNG' where it was Data and Wesley (or Ro, or whoever). Okay, so 'Voyager' had Paris alone up front, but that bridge was massive in comparison so it was easier for Tom to banter with the other characters, whereas in this series the space is so small, Travis has the camera shoved right up his nose and has to stay stock still or he'll block the more 'important' characters for their moments.

It's sad, but Hoshi also barely featured, a symptom of one of the season's, and series', problems. Things were set to hot up for Reed. As security officer he'd be in the front line for whatever nastiness might ensue in the Expanse, as well as dealing with the military, who are mentioned, but not seen. I liked the new photonic torpedoes and their familiar oval coffin shape, and he seems almost ready to relish this new mission, but then his homeland hadn't been sliced up. It was a bit of a problem that it was only North America that had been attacked as it doesn't give us non-Americans as much personal investment in the attack, as terrible as it was. I wasn't sure if the scale was right and if it was likely that seven million would have been killed from such an attack.

The Vulcans were their usual annoying selves, mainly represented by Soval, and although his dire warnings about the Expanse were worrying, I didn't feel, as with much of the episode, that the recorded images from a Vulcan ship that returned from there caused a chill. There was too much cutting, and it had been done better in 'TNG' and 'DS9,' possibly even 'TOS.' It should have served as an intense primer for the dangers they might experience, but instead it was too indistinct, with no narrative and went on too long. Lack of sound didn't help. It was good to see a bit more of the impending future of Starfleet, with three smaller ships coming to the NX-01's rescue with an actual captain for Archer to talk to, a rare occurrence indeed. It was also lovely to get a short viewing of the NX-02 under construction. Even amid this bad news and negative mission of attack there was room for a bit of hope in the future. I'm not saying the episode was bad, I was very interested in the idea of a race from the 26th century sending a weapon back in time, or in this case, sending a message to build a weapon. How did that piece of future tech reach the Xindi if they can only communicate with the future, and not receive things? Will all be revealed or will we be left to wonder as was the case with the Temporal Cold War?

The series needed a shot in the arm, but it shouldn't have been necessary. It shows that the series had very little direction, even considering they were expecting it to last for seven years. They were coasting, and through this we learned (if we didn't know it already), Trek doesn't write itself after all. It needs all the guidance and energy it can get, it wasn't enough to take a 1960s TV model of individual episodes that have little relation and are an excuse to tell unrelated stories so they can be watched in any order, with the occasional addition of more contemporary arcs and character exploration. The TV landscape had changed. They should have taken a leaf out of 'DS9's book and worked in stronger continuing stories while seeing each episode as an opportunity to have fun with the characters. They tried to simplify what was already too simple for audiences who expected Trek to change with the times. So they did change (and took several leaves out of 'DS9's book; namely the Dominion).

I'm not going to judge Season 3 in this review, that's for me to watch and rediscover. But I will say that 'Enterprise' was a learning curve when perhaps they thought it was a done deal, not an excuse to gain more ratings by making the characters easier to write and less moral so they'd appeal to modern audiences, but a piece of work that needed all the skill and nurture the other series' were given. Season 2 ends without a 'To Be Continued…' For a while there it might have ended at that and we'd never have known what came next. It's fortunate the series was spared until it found its feet, cruel that it was cancelled once it had. But although this episode was a bit of a mess, it does leave the viewer wondering what will come next. And I did like Archer's last quote, "Let's see what's in there," an inverse of Captain Picard's famous words at the end of his pilot episode.

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